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Sergio Larrain: Retrospective

Sergio Larrain’s work portrays people making the most of what they are given. Frame after frame in black and white you see situations that pull at your heart strings. “The abandoned children of Santiago were to be the subject of the first substantial work” by Santiago and were “a mirror of his personality and an expression of his desire for a better society.” The picture below depicts a young boy who was given coins on the street.

Santiago, Chili 1955

A memo on one of the walls said that the children on the streets were fed until they were 14 years old and then they are on their own. Looking at his work and reading what Agnes Sire, the exhibition curator, gave in the form of historical context, really makes you think about the meaning behind each image. It’s not just a black and white image – it depicts how someone lives their life every day. They depict moments that people of “good monetary standing” take advantage of and ignore, sometimes on a day-to-day basis. In Prague and even in Arles we have seen mainly adults or elderly people on the streets. And the idea of children living on the streets in those kinds of situations breaks my heart.

These children see a wooden fence as a play ground, a couple coins as money for their food for the week… we can’t possibly fully understand where these children are coming from, but Sergio Larrain’s work helps bring these moments to light and brings about awareness.